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Post by feather on Mar 22, 2017 1:38:45 GMT
I've been researching annatto coloring, bought some annatto seeds. I see why they use an high ph in making it, and it is partially water and partially oil. I made a mistake yesterday, mixing my calcium chloride with the annatto in water and it precipitated the coloring out into 'dots'. I added it to the cheddar anyway. Most of it started to 'melt' in the whey. So my cheddar has an interesting coloring, it is orange with dots of color. It's fine but I won't make that mistake again.
So the cheddar is drying now, in the kitchen at room temperature. It says to oil it and then cover with a dry band of cheese cloth OR wax it. I'll wax it when it dries.
Tomorrow I'll make parmesan for the second time (this is the cheese we eat so much of). We are up to 7 or 8 batches, all different kinds, 3-4-5 lbs each. So we'll begin tasting and eating cheese in a couple weeks. That is much more exciting than making it.
I've figured out I need to write out the recipe each and every time I make it because if I make a mistake, then I need to keep that in the records for when the cheese is aged out and we are eating it. I need a data manager and a taste tester. ha ha. So far I'm doing okay on my own. I'm not sure how to label the brined cheeses. With waxed cheeses I can wax a paper label and date onto the cheese, but with brined cheese I don't know how to make a label stick to it. Any ideas?
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Post by poppopt on Mar 22, 2017 14:32:03 GMT
Feather, I just wanted to say thank you for starting this thread!
Many moons ago, when I was much younger and actually milked cows on a daily basis, I had access to milk in any quantity I wanted, cheap. I even tried a bit of cheesemaking at the time but never got as far as you all are doing here. It's something I wouldn't mind trying again someday and these cheesemaking threads are encouraging!
I'm a bit late to the party and you've probably already talked about this in other places I haven't seen yet, but do you have a good source for milk? The one source I am acquainted with that has milk from cows the way I'd want them to be raised, fed and treated, it's $11/gal. Kinda ouches a little. Do you have your own cow(s) or goats?
Just wondered.
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Post by feather on Mar 22, 2017 15:09:31 GMT
@redfish, I have the brined cheeses, which are parmesan and romano, surface is now dry. I'm not so sure when I'm supposed to oil them just yet. I know I will want to wax them in a month or three months. I'm going to keep weighing them until they have lost 17% moisture, then wax them. I just don't want mix them up while I'm aging them! poppopt, thanks for popping in! I am using store bought milk, paying anywhere from $1.99/gal to $2.60/gal depending on the sales each week. Always cow's milk. I have no cows, no goats, and no chickens.
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Post by stickinthemud on Mar 22, 2017 15:44:02 GMT
I love this thread! I've never attempted to make cheese and have no source of milk but the grocery, but maybe someday... Just a thought on marking cheese- could you make a string net like used for hanging cheese for smoking & attach a tag?
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Post by feather on Mar 22, 2017 16:15:28 GMT
I love this thread! I've never attempted to make cheese and have no source of milk but the grocery, but maybe someday... Just a thought on marking cheese- could you make a string net like used for hanging cheese for smoking & attach a tag? AH!! stickinthemud , I have a good sized box of netting bags that I use to sell my larger orders of garlic, that might work if they are the right size! I'll have 4 of the 3-4 lb chunks of parmesan and romano to keep separated tagged and dated ready by the end of this week. I'll be able to flip them daily or weekly as required in the net bags. I was worried that I'd struggle with the store bought milk but it works just fine with the addition of the Calcium Chloride, which is very inexpensive. My recipes call for just one teaspoon of Calcium Chloride to 4 gallons of milk (plus the cultures/color/rennet). I'm making cheese every other day, so far, and the inbetween days I catch up on dishes and everything else. I hope you give it a try! ETA: Wanted to mention that you can buy the calcium chloride in a powdered form as well as buy it like I do in a water solution. I'm not sure of the amounts of calcium chloride powder to water concentration but that is probably easy to look up. I will probably start buying it that way when I run out of the water solution I have right now. Also, wanted ask redfish, what kind of cheese did you decide to make? April is coming up quick and you'll have more milk than you know what to do with it.
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Post by poppopt on Mar 22, 2017 20:55:23 GMT
Hope it's not too much of a stretch to ask in this thread but something I'm curious about from those who are making their own cheeses...
How do you find that your homemade cheese compares to cheeses that you could buy? As a for instance, when I go to the store and want a block of cheddar, my first choice is often Tillamook if I can find it, and then Cabot if I can't. Kraft is generally a last resort for my tastes. How would your homemade cheddar compare to a cheese like Tillamook or Cabot?
I know that's only one kind of cheese and there are LOTS of others to consider. But I was just wondering what your impressions were as far as a comparison. I've never been able to taste test side by side (yet).
Curious what any of you may think.
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Post by feather on Mar 22, 2017 21:12:09 GMT
poppopt, I'll be tasting the first short aged cheeses in the next 2-4 weeks, and the cheddar in months, the colby in 10 weeks, the parmesan not before 10 months, the romano not before 8 months. But, ah ahaha, the mozzarella and cheese curds were better than bought. And the ricotta had a better texture and taste than bought. Redfish has made cheese before.
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Post by poppopt on Mar 22, 2017 21:19:28 GMT
poppopt , I'll be tasting the first short aged cheeses in the next 2-4 weeks, and the cheddar in months, the colby in 10 weeks, the parmesan not before 10 months, the romano not before 8 months. But, ah ahaha, the mozzarella and cheese curds were better than bought. And the ricotta had a better texture and taste than bought. Redfish has made cheese before. Thanks, feather! Texture is something I hadn't thought a whole lot about before you mentioned it but that's important, too. Really enjoying the thread!
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Post by poppopt on Mar 22, 2017 23:09:23 GMT
Thanks very much for the insights, Redfish!! I appreciate hearing about some of the little things. FWIW, I never realized that cheddar wasn't aged all that long. I had figured a year or so would be normal. Ya know, I might just have to get my feet wet with cheesemaking again. It sounds like an awful lot of fun.
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Post by feather on Mar 22, 2017 23:51:40 GMT
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Post by poppopt on Mar 23, 2017 16:05:33 GMT
Hope I can ask another question, just something I wondered about. Lets say I make some cheddar, a rather large quantity, and discover that I really like the flavor of it at about 4 months and maybe not as much as it gets older. Is there a way for me to preserve that cheese in it's stage of "ripeness" right there? Freezing it maybe? Or would that ruin it? It's just something I wondered about. There may not be a way other than to keep making them and eat them at the stage I like. But I had to ask.
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Post by feather on Mar 23, 2017 17:36:49 GMT
poppopt, That's a good question and not one I have enough experience to help with. The recipes and methods I'm using are from Gavin Webber, his videos on youtube and his blog. When he gets a cheese just to 'the right place', he puts it in a small container and keeps it in the refrigerator. He also wraps pieces (say quarters) of his cheese in a grease free paper (maybe wax paper) then foil, or alternately just foil, then he puts it in his refrigerator. The other thing I've seen him do is to use a seal a meal type sealing machine to store it, I would assume, in the cheese cave, or the refrigerator or freezer. The draw back to the freezer is that some cheeses (not mozzarella) will get crumbly and not hold its shape as well for slicing. I haven't bought a seal a meal type sealer yet, but I may at some point. Cave is about 55 degree F. Refrigerator is about 34-38 degrees F and will slow down the maturation. Freezer is less than 0 degrees F and will slow down the maturation the most. I have frozen mozzarella with no problems. Cheese curds I've frozen, they get just a little more crumbly than fresh. The curds hold their shape but crumble a little as you bite into them. No one here is complaining. Since we will be grating romano and parmesan, freezing it really won't matter. It will be the cheddars and colbys that are going to be touchy for storage. Today, the weather is warming and I can't store milk outside safely during the day, and there is no room in the refrigerator, so we'll have to buy milk, timing it so it stays cold. And milk went on sale with a coupon starting today, ending next Thursday for $1.99/gallon again, off we go on a cheese making spree. Parmesan was made yesterday, and today Romano (no days off) again. I have cheddar cheese waxing today.
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Post by poppopt on Mar 23, 2017 18:13:50 GMT
Thanks for the discussion!! I'm learnin'.
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Post by feather on Mar 23, 2017 18:44:32 GMT
I just made a small crescrenza. Its a fresh cheese that keeps a LOT of milk in it. The finished product is almost jello like. You can slice it and spread it. It tastes milky with a tad of sharp. It's interesting. I had to look up your cheese @redfish, as I had never heard of it before. I ran across this recipe: www.cheesemaking.com/Crescenza.htmlThe recipe mentioned putting the salt in with the culture or before the culture. Most cheese recipes don't do that as the salt inhibits the culture to some extent. Large cuts, no cooking the curd, then repeated room temperature turnings. That keeps the liquids in it longer. Interesting. Definitely something I'll have to try. Though, I bet with your premium milk from your goats you get a better cheese than something I might make with store bought cows milk. Good for you.
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Post by feather on Mar 24, 2017 0:46:04 GMT
Wax!!! I was struggling to get my clear wax to 200 degrees F, I wanted it to go to 210 degrees F and it wouldn't under any circumstance. I finally settled on 195 as I was rewaxing tiny portions of three soft cheeses. Then I switched to my red wax for the cheddar. Switching took hours, wax is messy, lots of clean up and then reheatin. Well that stuff went to 205 degrees F without a problem. So I'm learning that the color helped and the method of my double boiler is not the problem at all. I had no idea why I couldn't get that temperature up!
I saw a tiny bit of mold under my clear wax on the soft cheeses, tiny tiny areas, which I cut out. I was glad I could see it. I'll be keeping a close eye on my red waxed cheddar now to see if there might be any mold.
I finished the second parmesan tonight, brining, the second romano is now made too, brining tomorrow.
We decided on a second mold, in the square shape, the follower was too small and so DH made a new one, this one works much better so my parmesan2 and my romano2 are both squarish.o I am so tired now.....
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Post by stickinthemud on Mar 24, 2017 3:20:38 GMT
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Post by feather on Mar 24, 2017 3:45:07 GMT
My altitude is 978 feet, though, given that clear wax won't get hotter than less than 200 degrees F, while red wax does get to 205, it doesn't probably depend just on altitude. That is not a bad idea to check that. It probably depends more on the difference in chemical composition. Clear wax or red coloring plus clear wax. Or even more likely, on my attitude. I'm so tired, I'm not even sure what my attitude is right now. I'm up late making Reuben sandwiches. Homemade sauerkraut and corned beef on marbled rye. I think once a half of one of those sandwiches hits my stomach I'll fall right to sleep. I hope my son eats the rest, as he will be home in 45 minutes. Did anyone else have hail and big thunderstorms? We were pelted tonight.
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Post by feather on Mar 24, 2017 17:52:19 GMT
On the rewaxing. All told I probably rewaxed a dozen areas on three waxed cheeses. So 4 places on each. There was only one area of mold under the wax that wasn't from a thin area of wax, or an open spot or a crease in the wax--so these are issues with me learning to wax the cheese well in the first place. I probably lost less than 1/2 ounce of cheese to the 12 lbs, so not too much.
Equipment issues. It's good to have two sets of measuring teaspoons, I have a regular metal set and now a small metal set. That way I don't have to mix any of the cultures with rennet or coloring or calcium chloride, or have to wash everything in the middle of when I'm making the cheese. My press is tied up tonight until the romano is done, at about 11 pm tonight, while the cheddar I'm making today will need the press around 6 pm, so one of them is going to be short changed on pressing time. It's also good to have two full size molds, since I'm making cheese for a few days in a row instead of alternate days.
The parmesan comes out of the brine about 10 tonight. The romano will go into the brine with some salt added to replace what the parmesan took out. I made these two in a square mold this time.
Here is the surprise, to me......I've been so bleary eyed making cheese so fast, I didn't realize that one of my soft cheeses (not soft like cream cheese, soft meaning it doesn't need a hard 50 lb press, only 25 lbs or less) is coming due TOMORROW. I kept thinking it was still weeks away.. So being that it is saturday, we will have a cheese tasting party, DH, son and myself. The cheese that is done is called caerphilly, it is a salty cheese, white, soft, and it only takes a total of 3 weeks in the cheese cave. It used a mesophylic culture, it was cheddared for a small amount of time, milled by hand and salted, then pressed @10 and 15#s and salt was rubbed into the top and bottom before drying it. I hope we really like it! I'm excited about it and nervous too.
I'll get ya pictures of the red waxed cheddar, the square parm and romano, the caerphilly when we cut into it and taste it, and if anything is interesting in the cheese cave when I check everything out, and turn and wash the cheeses.
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Post by feather on Mar 27, 2017 2:44:28 GMT
Today, actually right now, tonight, I'm waiting for milk to cool to make some mother cultures so I don't have to buy so much of the thermo and meso cultures. They can get pricy. Here are the instructions for the method I'm using. www.culturesforhealth.com/learn/cheese/making-keeping-mother-cheese-culture/Boil the jars/boil the lids, boil the skim milk, cool to 75 and 110, culture it for 8 hours for one and 20 hours for the other. I bought some deli containers, so 8 oz of mother cultures per container, then freeze it. Pictures. This is making the brine (for parmesan, romano, gruyere), boil 2 quarts of water, add 1 cup of salt, 1/2 t calcium chloride, 2 tablespoons of vinegar. Can be used over and over again. I have a square and a round ice cream pail I use for brining and I just put a lid on them to keep them. This is brining the romano2 (second romano) that I made in a square mold and square brining pail. This is the square parmesan2 (second parmesan) air drying. Each day I make cheese the first thing that gets done is to bring in the milk to get it closer to room temperature and then start the roaster to boil equipment. Anything that can't be boiled is dipped in boiling water or wiped down with vinegar. I drain everything on just bleached towels and pour the boiling water down both sinks to make sure the sinks are clean too. To handle the cheese, I wash my hands and douse them in vinegar from a squeeze bottle by the sink. Not a very good picture. This is the red waxed cheddar1 (second one is drying in the kitchen now). I wrapped up the quarters of the 4-5 lb round of caerphilly in waxed paper and foil, labeled. Put some in the refrigerator, one quarter in the freezer, two quarters in the freezer section of the cheese cave. And here we are taste testing the Caerphilly. It was good, a little like brick cheese, not as salty as feta cheese. This would make great grilled cheese, as it melts. It would be good cubed up for a salad topper too. It was a great success and I'd give the texture and taste a 7 out of 10. You can see it slices nicely. I removed the wax to be reheated and filtered for another cheese on another day. I'll be back to making cheese for a couple days, milk is on sale through Tuesday, I now see. I'm not sure what to make tomorrow but I do have some swiss cheese culture, so that might be the thing to make. DH wants more colby of course. If he was stuck on a deserted island with only one cheese available he would choose colby. If I had to choose between choosing cheese or crackers, I'd choose cheese. If you had to choose between your spouse or cheese, would it be a difficult decision? I ended up mixing up my cultures on Friday, so instead of cheddar, I ended up making gruyere--I had the wrong page in the cheese log open! I made cheddar yesterday. I have 4 cheeses air drying at room temperature, parmesan2, romano2, gruyere, and cheddar, in the kitchen where I can admire them. Cheese that is less than a week old gets turned daily, cheese that is more than a week old generally gets checked and washed on Tuesdays and Saturdays. I'm aiming for making enough cheese for a year as gardening is approaching and I'll need time to work on that. How much cheese do you think a family of 3 would eat in a year? Do you think a 5 lb round of cheddar would be a nice christmas gift? People I love have been getting homemade soaps and garlic for quite a few years, cheese might be a great change. I haven't heard of bacon cheese but it does good doesn't it?
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Post by feather on Mar 30, 2017 4:34:42 GMT
Made Emmentaler yesterday. Started kefir today. Made Jarlsberg today. Waxed the second cheddar today. Added weekly calendar pages to my cheese journal, too much to remember in my head.
I can't help but wonder if bacon cheese is just some cheddar ground up, with cooked bacon ground up, mixed, warmed slightly and pressed into a shape. MMMM bacon makes everything better.
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Post by poppopt on Mar 30, 2017 11:46:25 GMT
Bacon seems to be the craze in most all cooking these days, from salads to desserts, cheese to ice cream. Not a bacon person here. But I do like cheese that's been smoked. I like the flavor that it adds to a macaroni & cheese or maybe a ravioli filling.
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Post by feather on Apr 5, 2017 1:57:58 GMT
A report from cheeseville since March 29th.
3/31 Made Gruyere2 (second one) which is drying in the kitchen 4/1 Made White Cheddar3 (third cheddar, first white) which is drying in the kitchen, needs wax 4/2 Made White Cheddar4 (fourth cheddar, second white) which is drying in the kitchen, needs wax These two cheddars I'm going to age a long time, more than 12 months, depending on how hungry we are. 4/3 Made Brick for the first time, I just took out of the brining solution, it goes into the cheese cave. 4/4 Made Emmentaler2 (second Emmentaler), which is in the press. To be brined tomorrow.
Washed all the cheese in the cheese cave.
Butterkase taste test: This cheese only takes 5 weeks to age. Unwaxed it, it is beautiful, white, soft, creamy, pliable, melt-able. There was good hole development. Everyone loved it. It makes great grill cheese sandwiches and when you pull the halves apart, the cheese pulls between them in a melty way. This would be good in any mac and cheese and with it tasting so mild it would go with cheddar and parmesan and add creaminess to the sauce.
Tonight I took out my nightmare cheese, the one with the pictures of the mold that looks like brains, havarti. The mold took on a life of its own, mostly orange colored. As time went on the edges started to see slippage between the moldy mold and the cheese body. The cheese just under the mold was turning into something creamy and shiny softer than cream cheese, for about 1/3 inch under the mold. The cheese originally came out of its mold form in a round that was about 6 inches high and 6 inches wide and transformed into a cheese that was round and 2 inches high and 9 and 1/2 inches across. It looked like a pie. So I tore off the mold and scraped off the creamy soft cheese, not sure what to do with it, so I threw it out. Next time I might put the creamy stuff in a container to use later. Then I took the cheese main body and put it in a bowl and tasted some of that. Havarti is not supposed to turn into what you've seen pictures of it--I think the recipe is too wet, and the curd needs to cook a little longer. I'll try it again with a modified recipe.
Havarti taste test: It was delicious and just as expected for havarti. Soft, white, mild, melt-able, pliable, very good. It had some hole development. Looked and tasted just like the havarti in the store except for the creamy cheese on the edges.
These two cheeses, Butterkase and Havarti, have always been the kind of cheeses we like in our cooking and sandwiches but they are more expensive than we usually like to spend. I'll probably always have at least one of them on hand. What fun, I'm tired.
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Post by feather on Apr 8, 2017 2:55:17 GMT
4/6 Guinness infused cheese 4/7 Jarlsberg2 in the press, brined tomorrow.
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Post by feather on Apr 11, 2017 2:41:19 GMT
@redfish , I wish you lived closer so you could try it. 4/8 parmesan3 4/9 day off 4/10 day off!!! Waxed the two white cheddars and noticed some seepage from a previously waxed cheese. I may have to tear it open and see what's going on in there. For waxing now, I'm heating the wax to 125-140 225-240 degrees F, in the 24 hours before waxing, wiping it down with a brine solution and drying, in the 30 minutes before waxing, freezing it quickly to cool it.
Redfish, I remember you told me that you liked your cheddar at 3 months and it got too acid or sharp? if left to ripen longer. I saw a video talking about cheese that gets too acid or sharp with more time, that adding a bit more salt slows down the fermentation. For a cheddar, instead of using 3 T salt for a 4 gallon batch, they now recommend 4 T salt (even more) for a 4 gallon batch, so almost a tablespoon per lb of cheese. Something to ponder. I'm adding more salt to my cheddars now than I did in the beginning.
Swiss eye formation. Some swisses, Emmentaler, are put in the cheese cave at 55 degrees F for a week, then left at room temp for 2 weeks for eye formation, waxed, then back in the cheese cave. Some swisses, Jarlsberg, are dried, waxed, put in the cheese cave for 2 weeks, then left out at room temperature for 4-6 weeks to form eyes, then back in the cheese cave. Gruyere is put in the cheese cave and not waxed, brine washed rind, not taken out for any eye formation.
So the other day it was time to take the Emmentaler1 out into room temperature. It is starting to bloat. It starts out in the shape of a drum and as it expands the edges of the drum start to deform, the top starts to bulge, it gets turned over, the bottom starts to bulge, the sides bulge. It is cool. My DS said to me, 'you are going to leave the cheese at room temperature for weeks?'....Yeah, who knew.
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Post by feather on Apr 11, 2017 15:04:57 GMT
Redfish, goat's milk really is different than cow's milk. I have to buy the lipase (mild and strong) for my long aged parmesans and romanos. I've seen recipes for parmesan with and without lipase. I won't know if we like it until next winter, that is a long time to wait for the results of the experiment.
How are your goats?
I had my temperatures of the wax off by 100 degrees, in my last post, so I fixed it. Thanks for mentioning temperatures. I was reading that wax can be heated to 160 for the second coat but I worry so much about how dangerous it can be. They suggested using an electric pan/frying pan, which would get it away from direct flame. I might look around at rummage sales and see if I can find one to use for wax.
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Post by feather on Apr 14, 2017 0:50:52 GMT
Batch of mozzarella, into the freezer in 8-8 oz labeled containers for pizza. Merlot infused cheese, comes out of the press tonight. I wrote a list to post on the refrigerator today, for DH and DS, do not buy cream cheese, or yogurt, or kefir, or cottage cheese, or sour cream, just let me know and I'll make it.
Redfish I'm excited for your upcoming births! Please let us in on that fun.
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Post by feather on Apr 18, 2017 3:34:02 GMT
After making the really weird looking merlot infused cheese, then, the next day I made a sage derby which uses sage for flavor and spinach for color in a cheese much like cheddar. Today I made parmesan4. Parmesan is such a cooked dry cheese, the 4 gallons of 2% only makes about a 3 lb block. Knowing that, I wish I had 2 roasters for that cheese and 8 gallons would make a nice 6 lb block. I want to wax the older parmesans but I see there are a few little creases and cracks (not too deep) but the mold may continue to grow in those and I don't want that under the wax. I may just lop off parts of the cheese that has the creases and cracks to wax it as I don't know what else to do. I've tried brine washing with a brush but the little bit of mold still forms in those places. So for couple pictures. This is my brain cheese (havarti) when the brain like mold was gone for the most part, the reddish mold took over, I kept washing it and let it go until it was aged out at 6 weeks about. It is creamy on the outside once the mold is removed, the inside much more solid, quite delicious. It kind of looks like a pie in shape, it originally was 6.5 inches across the mold but when finished it was 9.5 inches across. I cleaned it up and sealed it in plastic in our new FoodSaver. Okay well my emmentaler1 was one week older than my emmentaler2. After being in the cheese cave at about 55 degrees F and 80-90 relative humidity for a week, it then comes out of the cheese cave and sits at room temperature for a week or two. The one on the left emmentaler2 came out of the cheese cave today, you can see it has mostly straight sides and no bloating. The one on the right is emmentaler1 which has been sitting at room temperature for a little over a week to form swiss eyes inside. You can see how it is bloated on the top and sides (and bottom). I waxed the emmentaler1 today, and it goes back in the cheese cave for 3 months of aging. The second emmentaler2 will sit out now for 10 days to bloat and then I wax it. The 'other swiss' Jarlsberg1 and 2, are kind of the opposite. They air dry and get waxed, sit in the cheese cave for 2 weeks, then sit at room temperature for 4-6 weeks (for the eye formation), so the first one is all waxed and came out of the cheese cave today and now in its waxed form, will sit out in the kitchen enjoying my company. I'm a little worried the wax will split when they expand. I taught my husband about cleaning the cheeses with a brine solution, brush, drying, etc, yesterday in case something happens to me and he needs to take care of them. He is not amused. Most of the cheeses are waxed and what isn't waxed will be waxed at some point except for the gruyere1 and 2. So it's not like it will be a heavy burden to wash the cheeses after a few more weeks here. Wow, in the beginning the molds just took over and it was a burden, but now, as things have calmed down mold wise, and I'm washing them every 2 days, it's not too much to do. The last picture. Top right is the sage derby cheese which came out kind of crooked. I'm concerned that it used spinach leaves to add color as vegetable matter with cheese may ROT or mold but I followed the recipe anyways. It gets waxed when it is dried out in a few days. I washed it in a salt water brine today, hoping to hold off any mold. The bottom left is the parmesan3, just about ready to put in the cheese cave. You can see some cracks and creases that I'm not happy about. I hacked off a bit of them today but I can see places that will not be easy to wash. The bottom right is the merlot infused cheese (which I waxed tonight). You can see the blotchiness (spell checker thinks this should be bitxxxxxiness ) of this cheese. It is supposed to be quite a stunner visually when it hits the cheese tray. I can only hope that the TASTE is good, since that is what matters. I'm slowing down making cheese finally. I have more to make but only a few. The good weather is calling, the tranplants are growing great, gardening is going to take over fast.
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Post by feather on Apr 24, 2017 16:07:32 GMT
Three cheeses have been cut and tasted and have ripened to their maturity date of 4 or 5 or 6 weeks, the butterkase, havarti, and caerphilly, sealed in 8 oz, 1 lb, or 2 lb portions with a FoodVac and either frozen or refrigerator. Six cheeses are upstairs at room temperature, 3 ripening swiss types making eye development, 2 drying to be ready for wax, and one in a ripening box to become a blue cheese. I made the blue cheese this past week, only a 2 gallon batch instead of my regular 4 gallon batch. The rest of the cheeses are in the cheese cave (refrigerator at 55 degrees in the basement). Some will be mature by the end of May, some in June....up to a minimum of 8-10-12 months and the Cheddars and Parmesans and Romanos can go longer. There is leeway in when they can be cut open. Cheddar can be eaten at 3 months, or 6 months, or....a many year aged cheddar, so we have choices. I need at least one more shelf in the cheese cave.
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Post by feather on Apr 24, 2017 16:58:30 GMT
Your cheese frig is soooo pretty! How were your tasted cheeses? Give it a week or two for the colostrum to get out of the milk, and I get to start on cheese again yay! I really want to age a manchego and see what it does. So far they disappear almost before they come out of the mold, which just isn't working when I only have enough milk to make one every 2-3 weeks. We also miss homemade string cheese. Soon...... Thanks! Let see...Havarti--it has a good mild taste with small holes, white, creamy, melty. Butterkase--also a good mild taste with tiny holes, creamy and melty. Caerphilly, a cheese from England, saltier and a little like brick cheese. Brick (forgot that one) is short aging, smooth, good for a grill cheese sandwich or eating out of hand. Mozzarella--froze for shredding or cut in sticks and breaded for baking or frying to snack on. Cheese curds--for eating out of hand. I purposely made some short maturing cheeses, as our mouths were watering with all the cheese talk every day, so we had to make some that were more 'immediate gratification type' cheeses. The next cheese we open will be the colby and we are SO looking forward to that as that is DH's favorite, end of may. The manchego, like the cheddars, parms, romanos, we must have patience, UGH!!! It is hard to wait, and wait, and wait. Even though I've made 4 parmesans and 4 cheddars, if I intend to give some of them LONG aging, like 2 years or 4 years. I must continue to make those cheeses, so the extra, and there must be extra available, can continue to age for longer periods, otherwise we'll eat it all up and be without for a long time again. This is hard to do for me because I don't even know if I'm doing a good job or not as I've never done this before. I try to follow the recipe (and there are dozens of recipes, many different ingredients, timing, temperatures), and they smell right, and they dry right, and they look right, but who knows how they'll be in 2 years? I bet you are so excited to be having milk to make cheese soon! I can't wait to hear about it. I would like to say, 'you are so lucky to have goat's milk' but I know, it's not luck. It's a lot of work and patience and perseverance and the daily milking and the hygiene that goes with it. It's a lot of work, but good for you for having something so special and good for your family. A labor of love for sure. I'm looking forward to all your cheeses and fun with the goats.
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Post by feather on Apr 27, 2017 5:10:12 GMT
Sometimes with my posts I feel like I'm a little 'out there', so thank you for being interested or liking my posts.
Yesterday was a gouda day! Yeah, cheesy humor. Tomorrow I'm going to make a smoke flavored Gouda. Gouda is one of those cheeses you can eat in only 2 months, soft, young and mild or you can leave it age and it dries to some extent, and gets more 'brittle' and the flavor more sweet or nutty.
I still haven't bought or found all the cultures I'm interested in having, to make different types of cheeses. I have mild and sharp lipase (for parms and romano and piccante provolone), the thermo and the meso, flora danica (M type fragrant, more buttery), Propionic shermanii (for hole development in swiss types), kefir (both M and T type), buttermilk, and yogurt (T type). I don't have the linens type, the stinky feet smell for making muenster, Limburger, some brick. I don't have the geo and candidas blooming type of mold for Camembert or brie. I've hacked the roqufortii mold by taking a domestic blue cheese, the blue veined area, and blending it with distilled water, to grow that for my blue cheese and it seems to work just fine and I froze the remainder for future batches of blue cheese. (my spelling may be off on cheeses and cultures as I'm not checking them consistently)
I checked on my blue cheese which is ripening in a ripening box in the freezer area of the cheese cave and about 4 degrees colder than the rest of the cave, and part of the cheese is just becoming blue, I turned it over and poked holes in it, since oxygen is necessary for blue mold, this will create blue inside the cheese.
I have three swiss types of cheese at room temperature in the kitchen, one emmentaler2 and both Jarlsbergs. This is for hole development. I turn them once in the morning and once each evening to make sure the holes expand in both directions. The jarlsbergs are waxed and the first one has started to expand, it cracked the wax along the top edge and now it is busting out of the side wax trying to escape. Once it reaches maximum hole development size, who knows what that is, then I suppose it gets rewaxed and put back in the cave or vacuum packed for freezing/refrigerating.
Tonight we tried some fried cheeses. First the brick, a thick slice in a pan with a little butter, fried it until it was soft and browned it on both sides, delicious. This would have been phenomenal with some marinara sauce. Then some caerphilly, browned on both sides, a little salty but good. Then parmesan in wafer thin crisps, also known as 'frico', yum, a good appetizer, better hot than cold. The frico's would be great with an eggplant or chicken parmesan for garnish.
Directions for a frico: By the tablespoon full, grated parmesan, either fry or on a parchment lined baking sheet or a silicone baking mat in a baking sheet, bake until melted and crisp. It only takes a few minutes and you can spice it up with a little garlic or red pepper flakes. No carb snack.
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